New Study Fine-Tunes Diabetes, Statin Link (WSJ): A new analysis published in The Lancet of a 17,000-patient study suggests people at risk for diabetes are more likely to develop the disease while taking statins, though the heart-protecting benefits outweigh the risks.

It May Be Time to See a Doctor (WSJ): Quarterly results from insurers and hospital operators indicate people are heading back to the doctor for checkups and other procedures after years of economic malaise reduced use of outpatient care….

Study Finds 31% of Doctors Shun Medicaid (WSJ): Nearly a third of doctors in the U.S. said they wouldn’t accept Medicaid beneficiaries, according to a government study published in the journal Health Affairs on Monday. Results varied by states….

FDA Approves Weight-Loss Drug Belviq (WSJ): After years of delays, Arena Pharmaceuticals’ lorcaserin, to be marketed as Belviq and distributed by Eisai Co., will be the first new drug treatment for weight loss in more than a decade….

Doctors Struggle to Make Ends Meet (WSJ): Physicians frequently have to make a big financial commitment to upgrade information-technology systems and other services, leaving them fearing getting squeezed as the U.S. moves toward new ways of paying for health care.

A federal rule that requires tobacco companies to display pictures of diseased lungs or other graphic images on cigarette packs is unconstitutional, a judge in Washington ruled Wednesday.

Regulations by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration would have required tobacco companies to display the images on the top half of cigarette packs, front and back. It was scheduled to take effect in September …

If you were a smoker, would seeing an image of plaque building up in your neck artery help you quit?

That was the central question posed by a study of 536 smokers recently published online by the Archives of Internal Medicine. Researchers wanted to know whether using ultrasound images of the carotid artery could serve as a “teachable moment” and improve quit rates when added to an intensive smoking-cessation program …

A study published earlier this week casts doubt on whether nicotine-replacement products like gum, nasal sprays and the patch help reduce relapse rates in the real world — that is, outside of clinical trials.

As the WSJ reports, a survey of smokers who quit found that those who used those products were no less likely …

Slowing March of Age-Related Diseases in Mice: Research published in Nature demonstrates how scientists used a drug in mice to clear out old cells that had stopped dividing in order to delay or halt age-related deterioration in certain tissues, the WSJ reports. An author of the study tells the paper that if the so-called senescent cells could be cleared in humans, age-related diseases might be treated as a group rather than one at a time …

President Barack Obama’s doctor gave him a clean bill of health and declared him“fit for duty.”

“The President is in excellent health and ‘fit for duty,’” Capt. Jeffrey Kuhlman, the president’s physician, wrote in a report following a medical exam at the National Naval Medical Center last week. “He is ‘fit at fifty’ and ‘staying healthy at 50+’,” the doctor concluded.

Obama measured 6’1” and 181.3 pounds, just a little heavier than he was at his February 2010 exam, when he weighed 179.9 lbs …